May 1995

“This is so not fair, my life is not fair, I should not be here, I should be home in bed, sleeping.”

That is what Jean said to her mother this morning when she dropped her off at the school for detention, she didn’t do anything wrong, she just threw a paperball at the teacher, and so he got angry at her.

“I’ll pick you up later, and behave yourself.” Jean’s mother told her.

“Yeah mom, whatever.” Jean grabbed her backpack and entered the school building.

“Now, you know Christina, this is the last time you do this to me understood, you know how important your cheerleading career is to you and to your grandmother.

“Mom, I know, I already remember the routine anyway, Jeez you don’t have to tell me every second.” Christina muttered.

“Ok fine, since you are so wrapped up into boys that is why I have to keep reminding you.” Christina’s mom said quietly.

Christina looked at her mom and scoffed, with that she opened the car door , closed it and entered the school building as well.

“I understand dad really, I would practice harder.” Justin muttered. “Just leave me alone for once.” He stepped out of the truck, slammed the door and walked off towards the school. Justin heard the tires screech looking back, he saw some other guys coming in, he just shrugged and continued to walk inside.

JC, Lance, and Joey barely knew eachother, they were coming from different backgrounds, and from different directions. The last guy that came in, was a troubled guy with tattoos, named Chris, who he preferred to be called Alan, was listening to his Walkman, the song he was listening to was by “Coolio: Gangstas Paradise” and he was rapping the lyrics out loud:

As I walk through the valley of the shadow of death
I take a look at my life and realize there's nothing' left
'Cuz I've been blasting and laughing so long, that
Even my mama thinks that my mind is gone…

High School library 7:30am

The seven teenagers all sat in different spots in the library, each minding their own business, awaiting for the principal.

Just then a middle-aged woman walked into the library, she was wearing a flowery blouse, thick-framed glasses, her grey hair tied into a messy bun, and her lips puckered.

“Well, well, well, look what the cat dragged in, some of you may or may not know me, and if you do, you obviously don’t care anyway, cause you are all young adults and think that you own everything, ahem, allow me to introduce myself, I’m Mrs. Pumperknickle, and you all will be staying here for eight hours, as for your assignments, I want you to each write your names down, and write an essay, fewer than 1000 words telling me why are you here? Do I make myself perfectly clear?”

“Perfectly clear.” Chris spoke out, using his pencil to write on the desk.

“You do not write on the desk Mr. Kirkpatrick.” Mrs Pumperknickle said.

Chris mocked her, “Oh I’m sorry, I just thought that the desks needed some bit of artwork that’s all, cause you know, they are as plain as your face.”

“Watch that mouth of yours, do you hear me? Do you want another detention?”

Chris just shrugged.

Mrs. Pumperknickle scowled at him and handed out the papers, but continued talking, “I don’t anyone moving out of their seats, no listening to your walkmans, no nothing, I’ll come back later for lunch.” And with that she walked back into her office.

“This is stupid.” Jean said, looking over at the two sheets in front of her, she sighed and decided to write her name down, her real name was Britney, but she preferred to be called Jean, cause she was sick of her parents expecting so much from her, she liked to sing, but her parents wanted her to be a doctor. She didn’t write her full name on, just her first name, she passed the paper to the young brown-haired blue eyed boy that was sitting on the next seat. Reaching to grab the paper, he took it and thanked her.

Jean stared at him for a second, she noticed that he was actually writing something on the other sheet of paper, “Is he actually doing the assignment?”

Frowning, she looked back at her own paper, and started to write a few things down as well.

When it was Justin’s turn to sign his name, he used his middle name instead, which was Randall, just Randall, he then passed the paper back, and they all used their middle names, they didn’t even speak to eachother or anything. Christina didn’t have a nickname or any sort of middle name for that matter, so she was just wrote her own name down.

Mrs. Pumperknickle then came in again, “Did you written down your names yet? Let me have a look.” Jean handed the paper to her, and she took it.

“Hmm, let’s see, “Jean?”

Jean raised her hand.

“Scott?”

JC raised his hand, but didn’t look up from his paper.

“Randall?”

Justin did the same, but he wasn’t writing, he was playing tic-tac-toe on the paper.

“Anthony?”

Joey let out a whistle.

“James?”

Lance did a knock on the desk.

Mrs Pumperknickle than called out Christina’s and Alan’s name, who also said they were present.

“Ok, so that’s everyone right?”

They all nodded.

Mrs. Pumperknickle then checked the list and went back to her office.

After a few minutes, Chris wanted to find something to do, he crumpled the paper up and tossed it in the trash, he looked at the blonde girl in front of him, who was busy drawing some flowers on the paper.

“Hey blondie.”

Christina turned around and glared at him, “What do you want?”

“Are you like, a girly girl? Are you drawing flowers on the paper, when you were supposed to be writing that essay?”

“Why does it mean so much to you anyway? I don’t even know you.” She replied.

“Because you look like the kind of girl that should finish her work, are you like a popular girl too?”

“Can you just leave me alone and let me finish?” Christina sighed and turned her back on him.

“Let you finish what? Drawing flowers?” Chris added.

And with that Christina got up from the chair and walked to where Jean was sitting.

“Hey, we weren’t supposed to move, that’s what Mrs. Bumblebee said.” Chris called out.

“It’s not Bumblebee, it’s Mrs. Pumperknickle.” Lance corrected.

It was Chris’s turn to glare at him, “Who asked you?”

“Well, why don’t you leave her alone Alan, she’s not bothering anyone.” Lance responded, getting up from the chair, trying to put on a brave face.

The other guys in the room were all staring, except for JC who was trying to break up the argument.

“Hey guys, don’t do this here, we’ll get into even more trouble, you wouldn’t want to spend another Saturday here right?” JC explained.

Lance just looked at Chris then grumbled to himself, and plopped down back on the seat.

“I thought so.” Chris added, “You are just like all of the others varsity boy.” He then stopped and looked at the corner of the room, he saw a Fuse box and he walked up to it.

“What is he doing?” Justin asked.

“I hope he injures himself.” Lance replied.

Chris opened the Fuse box, his idea, was to turn off all of the lights, except for the library and the principal’s office, since her office was next to the hallways, she would notice something wrong. He started to flicker them on and off, then on and off again, then he left them off; and ran back to his seat before the principal came.

“What is this?!” They all heard her say in the room, and they could hear footsteps.

“What is going on? Who tampered with the lights?”

“How should we know about the lights, you told us not to move out of our seats remember?” Chris answered politely.

That sent a giggle to Christina and Jean.

“You think this funny?” Mrs. Pumperknickle asked the girls.

Christina then stopped giggling and shook her head no.

“I’m keeping my office door open, I’ll be watching your every move, don’t mess with me.” The principal scowled.

“Nobody wants to mess with that old hag anyway.” Chris muttered under his breath.

“What was that Kirkpatrick?”

“Oh, I said I don’t wanna mess with that old bag right there.” Chris said innocently, pointing at nothing near the doorway.

That made the principal look, and as she was looking, he threw a spitball on her hair, she didn’t even notice it, and with that she headed back to the Fuse box to turn all of the lights back on, she was still frowning at them, then she went back to her office, keeping the door open, but the library doors closed.

That sent out a laugh in the room.

“She didn’t even notice the spitball on her hair.” Joey responded.

“Hey, you got the time? That clock is not working.” Justin asked.

“It’s only 8:30am dude.”

Justin sighed, “Your name’s Anthony right?”

Joey nodded slowly, “Yeah?”

“Well, this is gonna be a long day for us.”

“You said it boy, you said it.” Joey replied and put his head down to take a nap.